


Death, Yet The Force (so rise and shine)

by EclipseMidnight (EternalEclipse)



Series: it takes a village (to fix a world) [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends: Jedi Apprentice Series - Jude Watson & Dave Wolverton, Star Wars Original Trilogy, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Eventual fix it, Force Visions, Gen, Obi-Wan Needs a Hug, PTSD, Tags Are Hard, They're trying okay, Time Travel, lmk if there are any you'd like to see, lots of kids, mace's swearing, obi-wan gets a hug, so do lots of characters, this is a fix it after all
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-29
Updated: 2018-05-29
Packaged: 2019-05-15 07:04:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,911
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14785760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EternalEclipse/pseuds/EclipseMidnight
Summary: “Is that what we’re calling it now? Time travel?” Drallig asked.“Well, what else would you call it?” Mace asked. “We’re not in the Force. This isn’t some kind of shared vision. And we’ve got a war to stop, at least.”--In which the most eclectic group of time travelers wake up in 949 ARR (51 BBY) and attempt to unravel what the Force wants them to do and begin to take the necessary steps to ensure the survival of the Jedi in the future. Mace is just happy to have hands again, though he has to wonder if his life has ever included this many kids before.





	Death, Yet The Force (so rise and shine)

**Author's Note:**

> Hi guys! Sorry that the fic is a bit late, but I hope you enjoy it anyway!
> 
> Many thanks to asokatanos, who beta'd this for me!

Every night, he tied himself to the Force as he went to sleep. The Dark wasn’t exactly a comfort, but it filled the empty spaces of his mind and distracted him from the state of the galaxy for a few precious hours. So when that crutch disappeared one night, it was hardly a wonder that he woke instantly, thrashing and sweat-soaked. 

Mace Windu had always had a strong connection to the Unifying Force. In his initiate years, he’d received special training to be able to pick through what he’d seen and hold reality separate from the visions. That was how he’d come to spend time with Yoda, who had, among other things, trained him to use his gifts as the Order needed him to. Even Qui-Gon ‘Live In The Present’ Jinn had been a help in learning about riding the whole of the Force, back when they were padawans who couldn’t quite see past their own gifts.

The strength of his gifts also meant that, among the Jedi, he was one of those best-equipped to handle the Force acting out. He was used to it imposing strongly onto him, and holding onto his self even in the face of that. After the moment of gibbering, animalistic terror when the Force disappeared came a rush of relief and confusion when it seemed to return, but strangely. It felt a bit like a shatterpoint exploding right next to him, but more. With its return came a rush of memories that seemed to simultaneously be his already and that also seemed to be other, bits from the Force pressing themselves onto him.

He’d never been able to sense shatterpoints involving himself. It was not a limitation common to all of those who accessed the Unifying Force, but most either sensed things related to themselves and not much further, or were able to sense events relating to other beings throughout the galaxy but not their own fate. He’d never minded the limitation, but he had to wonder if this was what having a shatterpoint on yourself felt like.

He’d gone to sleep in a disused corner of a backwater planet, wondering if tonight was the night he’d be found by the eternally-patrolling clones while he slept. (He’d gone to sleep on his pallet in the Temple, thinking of nothing in particular, an unremarkable memory which disappeared under the weight of the decades that came after it). 

When he’d woken up surrounded by the walls of his standard room in the Temple, he was almost sure he was dead. He hadn’t thought that being one with the Force would feel like being in the Temple, but it was clear that he still had much to learn about the Force. 

There was a holopad on the bedside table. He picked it up, wondering what could possibly be on it, and froze as an issue of the Coruscant Daily popped up at his touch.  _ That newsholo had been closed down since the birth of the Empire. _ He almost forgot to be surprised about having hands as he began to look it over. The date was listed as Primeday, 21th of 3rd Month 949RR.  _ Sithing hells. _

The Clone Wars had broken out in 978RR. Thirty-two years before the Temple fell, and thirty-eight from when he’d come from. Why was such an old newsholo relevant to anything?  _ Sithing hells, _ he projected to whatever in the Force had sent it to him, only to freeze again.

The Force felt different than he remembered. It shone with the Lights of the many thousands of Jedi that had been snuffed out too early through the machinations of the Sith--though why shouldn’t it, if he had died and joined them? But that wasn’t quite right either.

He ran his hand over his head in thought as he looked around the room, eyes catching on the door to the fresher. A sonic, he thought, was a good place to start. Better than being overwhelmed with the living force-senses of thousands he’d felt die over the course of a day.  _ Kriff the Force. _ He yanked himself back into the present and tugged at his sleepwear.

Feeling more like an actual person when he was done, if not a shade closer to the Jedi Master he’d been, he set off to explore his current surroundings. It became quickly apparent that the Temple was indeed populated by the presences he’d felt, and that most of the Temple residents had not sensed anything amiss. No one gave him a second glance when he went into common spaces with his hood pulled up to signal his need for solitude in the crowd and, more practically, to hide his identity while among unknowns.

He’d passed an hour meditating on the edge of a popular area, basking in the almost too-Light sense of the Force and all of the half-way familiar Force-senses from his younger years. He’d passed another sitting in the commissary, picking at his food and feeling supremely out of place in the bustle of Padawans and Knights and other Jedi. He made sure to project serenity until he’d located the room he’d come from, at which point he began to prepare himself for true meditation. He couldn’t quite believe that any of it was real until he felt for the shatterpoints. 

The almost-tangible knots of Force he’d grown so used to feeling were either missing or dulled by the length of time they had until they would come to pass. The further in the future a shatterpoint predicted, the more uncertain its threads. A brand new web unfurled in front of him. All he could do was try to follow the threads, to hopefully understand what he could about the time and place he’d found himself in. 

The first ones he’d followed led to the Council chambers, where, as always, there were a number of grouped shatterpoints of varying intensities and maturities. The power held by some of the individual Council members, especially those who advised larger groups, was often enough to give them occasional personal shatterpoints as well. He’d never seen Yoda without at least three shatterpoints attached to his presence, and he doubted he ever would. He kept following the webs, looking for familiar events.

_ There _ . He felt a thread he thought he knew, one that reminded him of the Yinchorri Uprising. It tasted like their anger. If it truly was 949 RR, the uprising wouldn’t come to a head for a while yet, but it must have begun. He tested a few more, trying to remember the conflicts of the time.

He had been so absorbed by the war for so long that it had been all he’d been able to sense. Now, it felt as if he had all the leeway in the world, as he moved from conflict to conflict, from death to life to death again.

_ The Balance _ , he thought, _ if this peace is not to be consumed by war _ . It sounded like a prophecy all on its own.

Refocusing, he followed a different knotty thread to the initiate dorms. Several of the young ones had smaller shatterpoints attached to them. He’d seen that often enough when initiates hadn’t yet been chosen by a Master, and it wasn’t clear what path they were taking. One had a larger shatterpoint. Komari Vosa. He moved on quickly, wondering if he should intervene into that situation, knowing what eventually became of her.

Was he meant to intervene? Was this a test? He wasn’t sure he should, especially when he didn’t know why the Force had sent him there, but not intervening when he knew what would happen felt wrong as well. He refused to dwell on it too long--perhaps the Force would have answers elsewhere.

He spent several hours more checking through the various shatterpoints to see what he remembered and what was new. Somewhere along the line, he began to ponder again how he’d ended up where he was, wherever he was.

The Temple had burned, and yet he was in the Temple. The Jedi were dead, and yet he had spent the day surrounded by Jedi. And the Force felt  _ safe _ here. It had been a long while since he’d been able to feel another Jedi in the Force, but it had been even several years more than that since he’d last truly felt safe.  _ Before the war, even _ . It hadn’t felt safe when it was empty and silent with most of the Order gone to war, even though there was Dark on Coruscant to match the Light,  _ if only they’d learned what it was. _ Ponds and the 187th were the closest he’d come to true safety since he’d first gotten on the Council, and those memories still brought him comfort, even knowing that they’d been worse than killed, and the automatons with their faces would sooner kill him than spare him.

And here he was, all of the bad history wiped away, and he had nothing to show for it but memories and PTSD leftover from the war. And that was  _ better _ than what had come before, if the Empire truly didn’t exist wherever here was. Once he managed to pull himself back together, he was going to kill Palpatine, hug Depa, and either find Skywalker as a baby or ensure he’d never be found. Hells, but if he could he’d steal Yoda’s gimer stick and whack Yoda, Rancisis, and all the members of the Council who’d agreed to the damn war in the kneecaps.  _ Force fuck a Sith, he was done with war for the last sith-fucking time. _

He drew himself back into the present as he’d done thousands of times over the years, retracing the paths with the confidence of a person who knew what they were doing and could do it while getting shot at and dodging a rampaging gundark at the same time.

He’d learned to do a lot of things while being shot at, that last decade. He breathed out, and in again, suddenly exhausted. But, after all of that he was left with a growing sense that whatever he was meant to be doing, and surely there must be something, because there always was work to be done for a Jedi, the Force hadn’t sent him alone to see it through.

Following a tendril of Force-guided intuition, he’d made his way to the Archives and set himself up in a corner where a casual passerby wouldn’t be able to see his terminal. From there, it was a simple matter to slice into the general mailer that went out daily to all members of the Order, informing them of events and practicalities. In between a notice about faulty lighting on two of the floors of the main archives and a tutorial for junior padawans on using Form VI, he’d slipped a short note in the terse code they had devised during the Clone Wars. Decrypted, it read:

_ Go to not-barracks 16-021 at 12:00 in two days. _

The code was meant for situations where normal communications were impossible and was intended to get across as much information in the fewest words as possible. Still, there weren’t words for specific places in the temple. Between the security of the sheer number of Jedi in the Temple at a given time, generally being in the Core and the fact that, whatever Dooku had become, they doubted he would attack Jedi children over a different of ideology, it just hadn’t seemed necessary. He hoped that his workaround would be clear enough to anyone who would need it, and that two days would be long enough that any person who’d need to would see it in time.

There were two rooms that corresponded to the number he’d given, a part of the dorms and a specialized meditation chamber. It couldn’t be helped, with how many dorms there were, but he’d made a point of trying to choose a place that would be easy to find without breaking the code. He’d become familiar with the meditation chamber in particular once he’d gotten on the Council: it was where he’d developed and practiced the balanced perspective he’d needed for Vaapad. Most importantly, it was discreet.

He gave himself those two days to adjust. He passed the time until the meeting wandering through the Temple. The younglings in the creche were content with a warm pair of arms, and asked nothing more of him. They even tried to comfort him when his thoughts became distressed, bless their little hearts. He vowed to return more often. They deserved better than deaths in a pointless war, or worse, being cut down by one of their own. He visited the Archives looking for tomes on the Sith, claimed a spot in various meditations gardens, and successfully avoided anyone he knew particularly well while he wasn’t sure he could avoid getting immediately escorted to the mind healers.

It had begun to hit him, as a day had passed, and then another, that this truly wasn’t some kind of extended vision. He’d never been especially prone that kind of foresight in any case, and he didn’t think that being dead and one with the Force would leave him this level of corporeality and sensation. But, then, if he was neither dead nor in a vision, was he actually in the Temple in 949RR?

He waited in the meditation chamber as the clock ticked down. He almost wanted to flee back into the strange, anonymous safety of the past days. He knew better. If he’d been the kind to back down from a challenge he would never have been able to create Vaapad, let alone convince anyone he wasn’t Dark for channeling and using his anger. His last chance to back away from this universe had come and gone before he’d sent out that message. If the Force approved, any eyes that needed to see that message would.

The door creaked open. “Master Windu?” a male voice asked with some surprise. 

Mace stood and gestured the elder man in.  “Master Drallig. You saw my message?”

“Yes--I was starting to wonder if I was alone here when I looked through the Digest.” Drallig sat down across from him. “I needed to know what I was supposed to be teaching, and who’s to know where the Sith has eyes. I suppose it was the will of the Force.”

“What do you remember?” Mace steepled his hands together. Even with the Force’s guidance it was good to know he wasn’t alone in this, and Drallig had been trustworthy.

“Getting cut down in the Temple,” Drallig replied, shaking his head. “Skywalker alone I could have handled. But not him and the clones both. I tried to buy some time for my students to get away, but they fought instead.”

A knock sounded at the door. “Yes?” Mace called.

The door opened soundlessly, and Mace felt his eyebrows go up. “I hope I’m not late?” Tahl grinned from the doorway.   


“Master Tahl, I can’t say I was expecting to see you here,” Mace said after she pulled out a seat. “Where did you learn the war codes?”

“I was one with the Force, not blind,” she replied, pushing her hair behind her ears. “Well, sight didn’t come much into it, but that’s rather missing the point. I kept an eye on my former padawans, and Qui-Gon’s, as best I could. Qui-Gon learned of a technique that’s supposed to let your consciousness persist in the Force after you die, to the point of manifesting to those you care about, but I didn’t get that far, and it’s not permanent--I didn’t get to stick around past the end of the war.” She tapped her chin. “And I suppose it’s strange to say former padawan, since I’ve got Gena to worry about right now, and she’s a few years off from her knighting ceremony. Three, if I’ve got my years right. At least I have more than faith now that she’ll be an excellent Jedi.”

“Kriffing hells, I hate time travel. Depa’s gone for the next eight months, and not the person I remember yet.” Mace grimaced. “And we need to figure out our next move.”

“Is that what we’re calling it now? Time travel?” Drallig asked.

“Well, what else would you call it?” Mace asked. “We’re not in the Force. This isn’t some kind of shared vision. And we’ve got a war to stop, at least.”

“Can we do anything?” Tahl pointed out. “Even if it’s going to be soon, you’re not on the Council yet,” she pointed to Mace; “ I’m offplanet every other week with my padawan, and you’re a few years away from a senior Battlemaster’s post,” she gestured at Drallig. “And--” she continued, talking over Drallig when he tried to respond. “And we have more to worry about than the war, and sooner. Unless you’ve forgotten the deaths at Yinchorr, or even the slow fall of the Republic that made the Empire possible.”

“We can try to keep an eye on the Sith,” Drallig suggested, opening his hands. “I don’t know if they had anything to do with Yinchorr, or the Stark Hyperspace War, or the conflicts on so many planets. But we know their goals now.”

“Even those of us in the Force didn’t know who Sidious’s master was, past the name anyway, and since it wasn’t important then we didn’t go looking. And there’s nothing to say that Sidious hadn’t killed him by this point anyway,’” Tahl said. “Or don’t you remember?”

“I don’t remember being in the Force at all,” Drallig looked down. “What was the Sith’s name?”

“Plagueis.” Tahl spat.

“The Archives or the Holonet probably has information on Palpatine’s current whereabouts,” Mace suggested. “He’s probably a politician on Naboo--it takes time to get to the kind of place where you can be nominated for Supreme Chancellor without too much opposition--but he’ll be easier to track if he’s on Coruscant already. We can let him lead us to any other Sith that is around, since he’s probably not the only one.”

“The Force feels a great deal lighter than it did in the years before the war,” Drallig commented. “As convenient as it would be, I doubt he’s here, or if he is, I doubt he’s become a Sith. The Force’s not dark enough now to hide it, not like it was. And I’m already mostly Temple-bound, and you’re not, so I can spend time looking him up.”

“I’ll probably be sent back out soon.” Mace rubbed at his chin. “I’ll try to get sent out as close to the Chommel sector as I can, and see if I find any strange Darkness around Naboo. It’s probably choked with shatterpoints.”

“I’ve got my padawan to consider, and we’re still waiting on debrief from our last mission, according to my notes, so I don’t know what the current Council is going to decide for us. I’m just glad that I’ve written up my report so I know what to say. I’m not sure I want to let them know we’re back.” Tahl added.

“Spend some time with Jinn, if you can?” Mace suggested. “If I’ve got my years right, that sithspawn DuCrion’s still his padawan, and that was a huge kriffing mess.”

“DuCrion should still be a padawan, though he’s about to Fall, I believe. We can try to save them anyway, though I’d been talking to Qui-Gon about the path DuCrion’s been walking for years by this point,” Tahl agreed. “And I was going to do that anyway. He’s a friend, even if he wasn’t always a good one, and keeping all of them in the Light saves us all a lot of trouble.”

“And it was Yoda’s lineage through Dooku that ended up at the center of all of it,” Drallig said. “Dealing with that might prevent a lot of problems later.”

“That reminds me--Komari Vosa is a senior initiate right now.” Mace thought aloud.

Both of them grimaced. “I can try to influence the assignments so that she doesn’t end up with Dooku this time,” Drallig replied. “That was a rather public mess.”

“Maybe things would have gone better if she’d been trained by a female Master?” Tahl suggested. “I can think of a couple that don’t have padawans.”

“That is a recommendation I can definitely make.”

“We should also keep an eye on Dooku.” Tahl reminded them. “I never knew Dooku very well even when Qui-Gon was still his student, but I’ve heard that he started to draw away from the Order a bit after Xanatos fell, and that that was part of why Vosa got assigned to him in the first place.”

“Invite him to do a Makashi demonstration, perhaps with a group of younger initiates?” Mace suggested. “It’s fairly standard to recommend that a Jedi who’s losing contact take on a student, but in this case a class might be better.”

“Do we want him teaching anyone? After everything that happened? He was a Sith, that doesn’t just happen to a person.” Drallig argued.

“If we can keep him in the Light, we should. He may have become a Sith, but he’s not there yet. It certainly didn’t happen overnight,” Tahl argued back. “And don’t judge him for Vosa when that hasn’t happened yet. People said the same things about Qui-Gon, and Obi-Wan was one of the best of us--we all knew that as early on as Melida-Daan.”

“None of this is a problem for right now,” Mace cut in. “A recommendation for Vosa, a demonstration for Dooku, and someone to knock Yoda over the head while we’re at it. We’ll look into the Sith, and remember how to live in this year. Anything else?”

“It’d probably be easier to meet if we can do it more naturally than coming to an out of the way meditation chamber.” Tahl said.

Drallig’s holopad buzzed, and they all jumped. That tone was bit too much like the shipboard alarm for “prepare for boarding” for comfort. “I’ll have to change that tone. I’ve got a class in ten minutes. I’ll let you know if I find anything.”

“Yes, may the Force be with us.” Tahl agreed, standing as well. “What class is it? If one of us can demonstrate with you, and then we can be seen together more easily.”

He checked. “Soresu for some of the ten year old initiates, this afternoon. I know that’s not your usual, but you’d be welcome to impress them a bit.” Mace grimaced. He remembered sparring with Kenobi after he’d gotten conned into taking a Council spot; his spars were rarely so frustrating. Tahl chuckled at him as Drallig went on. “Fourth days at 11am is the Ataru class for some of the younger groups, and you might enjoy that a bit more.”

“I’ll be there,” Mace agreed, standing and moving to open the door. “May the Force light our paths.”

___________________________________________________________________________

Mace and Tahl both showed up early for the Ataru class and stood in the shadows as the younglings made their way in, a mixed group which notably boasted a young Obi-Wan Kenobi, who was only barely recognizable by his ginger hair, one who resembled Micah Giett’s next padawan, as well as the child who’d tried to blow up the Temple with DuCrion as a pre-teen.  _ Sithing hells, they’re tiny _ , Mace thought, folding his hands into his robes. 

Next to him, Tahl seemed to be having trouble keeping herself serene. “I never saw them when they were this small.” Mace looked at her, and she pointed at the Mon Cal youngling settled next to Kenobi. “Bant, my last padawan, she became a great healer. And Obi-Wan.” She clenched her hands together. “Qui-Gon was really not fit to take on a padawan when Yoda threw them together. I tried to teach him as I could, but I’m not sure he ever forgave himself for my death.”

“There are a great many things Obi-Wan Kenobi was good at, but knowing when bad events someone else’s responsibility was never one of them,” Mace agreed. “It’s something that all of us who are gifted with awareness of the Unifying Force fight with to one degree or another. With his gifts, he should have been assigned to a counsellor, a mind healer if necessary.”

“But as Qui-Gon’s student I wonder how often he would have gone.” Tahl turned to meet his eyes. “To be blunt, why didn’t you take him on? Yoda took an interest in him, that’s enough to say about his strength in the Unifying Force, and who else is there with abilities with the Unifying Force in the field who doesn’t already have a padawan? Pennigram? Me’qyun-Soim?  _ Sifo-Dyas? _ ”

Mace grimaced. “A few things. His disciplinary record painted him a as bully, and for a long time we never realized it was the other way around. Not until that white-haired kid tried to blow up the Temple. And Yoda had been pushing me at someone else, though Depa ended up taking on Yel’hiam in the end. By then we were already dealing with the fallout of pushing the Jinn-Kenobi team together. Sith hells, but it was their first mission that earmarked him for a seat on the Council, even if we’d expected to have it take longer than a couple decades.”

“And why not do it this time, once he’s older? I love Qui, but he was a poor teacher for Obi-Wan. And Qui’s dismissal of the Unifying did him no favors.” Tahl asked, turning back to look at the smiling, oblivious initiates who’d be fighting wars all too soon. “It’s hardly the only pairing we should be interfering in, as we’ve already said.”

Mace sunk into the Force and barely kept his silence when he sensed several shatterpoints already forming around the young ones, Kenobi included. At least one of those was new--they were already changing things.

“It’s not the first thing in this load of sithspit we need to deal with with that bunch. DuCrion’s a padawan, and falling. Vosa’s mess. Dooku might be half-Fallen already, and we don’t know when Sifo-Dyas went off the rails. It may have already happened, even. And that’s just to start, not even looking outside of Yoda’s lineage. If we’re doing that, we should also interfere with Master Fyreth’s assignment to that young Bothan, and convince the Council that Knight Ayter shouldn’t ever have a padawan. Need I go on?”

Before Tahl could respond, Drallig walked in and called the room to order. Mace gave Kenobi one last scrutinizing glance. He saw the lined face of General Kenobi, his memory of a friend, next to the smiling initiate, before he discarded the thought and stepped out from the shadows with his recent confidant.

The demonstration was rather simple. The younglings quieted down quickly once Drallig called them to order. Because Tahl was more versant in Ataru than Mace, she demonstrated the offensive, and Mace used the best Ataru he had on hand in defense, which suitably awed the class of fifty or so younglings. His lack of prowess in the style did not awe any of the adults in the room however, and he could tell that Tahl was laughing at him from behind her lightsaber. They both knew that using their own styles he could knock her around a salle and then some; Ataru’s acrobatic moves didn’t suit his tall, solid frame as well as they might someone smaller.

The initiates were far too young for some of the moves they had used, but the promise of them kept the intent children working through flexibility exercises without complaint. They were taught a beginner’s kata they were all meant to practice, and were promised another demonstration in due time. 

After a short human crechemaster came to collect the young ones, the three elder Jedi headed off to lunch in the commissary, at which point Mace rediscovered why he’d gotten such an extended break after Depa’s knighting. 

___________________________________________________________________________

The note was discreet, as all notes from the mind healers were. 

It was hardly his first time playing that game, not with how strongly the Unifying Force sometimes called to him. He’d had a lot of experience getting sent to the mind healers to get help with the things he’d been shown by the Force. He had definitely seen some truly unforgivable things over the years.

Depa had become his padawan in part because she had also had a gift with the Unifying Force, though it never shouted in her ears as it did in his. He still was there to help when her occasional visions proved particularly violent or painful, or to send her to the mind healers herself if it were beyond his ability. It was one reason that all those gifted with the Unifying had at least a mentor with a similar gift if their Master wasn’t the same.

He’d long since figured out how to avoid the healers unless a shatterpoint gave him a psychic injury, or something equally dire occurred. While he wasn’t as bad as many when it came to admitting that he needed help sometimes, he also didn’t usually see the worst results of shatterpoints, since he had a greater ability to pull away after the years he’d spent working at it.

He had no idea why he was being called there; it certainly wasn’t of his own accord. But he also wasn’t stupid enough to skip out on it, not if he wanted to take a mission anytime soon.

It was with some resignation on his part that he found himself in the homey waiting area of the mind healers’ realm. 

“Knight--err, Master Windu!” A hologram of a young human waved him over. “Healer Toki’s back, she’s ready for you in, uh, the second office--”

“Second office on the left, I’m aware, thank you,” Mace interrupted already moving to the room. The boy smiled at him, and disappeared again when he looked back that way. He looked again at his hands, grateful that he had them back and twisted the door open. “Healer Toki.”

“Mace! I hope you’ve been well. I know I’m late, but congratulations on your padawan’s success.” Healer Toki was a middle-aged Togruta woman in light Jedi robes with a MediCorps belt and a holopad in hand. “Have any shatterpoints been a bother lately?”

“Thank you, and not particularly, no,” he replied, sitting on the offered chair. “And congratulations on the baby as well.” He wondered briefly if she’d been killed when the Temple was invaded, before banishing the thought.  _ He was fixing that, force damn it! _

“Thank you! And that’s good! This is just a routine visit, as you probably know by now. Breaking a padawan bond has psychic backlash for everyone involved, and that leaves some people more open to the Force than they might like. From Healer Salyinn’s notes, I see that you’ve been having issues with that, but he was hoping to clear you soon.” She set the pad aside and looked him in the eyes. It was uncomfortable to look into her brown eyes and pretend that his worst worry was psychic backlash. “I’d like to check the site of the break, if you don’t mind?”

Mace breathed in deeply, feeling in his mind for where the bond between him and Depa had rested. It was fresher than he remembered, probably in part due to the fact he was in the body of his past self, though not as fresh as it probably should be. That was likely in part due to the fact that the padawan bond was a bonding of souls, which spanned both the mind and body--it was fresher in this body than in his mind. He hoped it wouldn’t be too obvious that it was well healed as he folded his shielding down around it.

Toki’s mental touch made him shiver, even as gentle as she was. She didn’t directly touch the wound, her training meant that she knew better. After what felt like an age, but was likely no longer than twenty minutes, she drew back, and he quickly rearranged his shields to cover the vulnerability.

“Well, that is healing surprisingly quickly, given everything” she said in a mildly concerned voice. “The backlash that Salyinn wrote about seems unlikely now. If you’ve not been having any trouble--and you haven’t?” Mace shook his head. “Then you’re free to go. You know the usual protocols by now--if you need anything, I’m here to help, even if that’s just dampening the Force for a while. I’ll have to talk to him when he gets out of quarantine, but we should be able to clear you within the month.”

“Thank you,” Mace tried for a small smile as he rose.

“May the Force be with you.” Toki pulled open the door with a small smile, shooing him out. Sifo-Dyas was in the waiting room, and it took some effort to just walk past the man without doing anything. To clear his head, he decided to go back to the creche for a little while. There were a lot of things that stressed him out, and dealing with things he likely couldn’t fix was certainly one of them.

Sifo-Dyas had become what he had been because of a set of visions. Mace was well aware that he was always one step from doing the same, as was Depa, and every other user of the Living Force. Well, probably not Depa--her visions weren’t nearly strong as his. But then few Jedi were on par with him for sensitivity, and Sifo-Dyas was one of them.

He wasn’t hiding from what the Force wanted anymore. He was going to fix what had come apart, somehow. He’d known that Balance included the Dark--how could he not, with his Vaapad?--but somehow he’d not realized how much of the Dark was just out of balance compared to the Light. His thoughts returned to the younglings.

Children instinctively used both. The youngest, anyway, hadn’t yet learned that the Dark was avoided by most Jedi, or that they were using it. The only reason he’d learned that they were using both the Light and the Dark together was because he had trained himself to be so sensitive to both sides individually. The Temple was blinding in the Light sometimes. It hadn’t been unpleasant, as he’d grown up with it that way, but after so long with the Dark shouting just as loudly all the time, he found he’d grown a bit more sensitive to it.

The babies, with their easy way and unknowing ability to mold the future, and their unconscious acceptance of true Balance, were calming.

They were also, as was being explained to him by a plump pantoran crechemaster, down for their naps, and he was not going to rouse them. There had apparently been a small disturbance earlier, and wouldn’t he rather help some of the other younglings through post-dinner meditations?

He hadn’t realized that he’d skipped dinner with his appointment, but he wasn’t hungry. The Force tugged at him insistently, in that way that had only started once he’d found himself in the past, so he went to follow it.

He landed in a group of mixed Hawkbat and Bear clan seven and eight year olds. He joined their circle and reached out to them in the Force, letting them use his presence to calm and center themselves. 

The young rodian brought to mind a serious but competent Jedi Knight, who had just taken her first apprentice, a shy human girl, not long before the war broke out. The loss of her padawan in the first half-year had nearly broken her. The human boy next to her had gone to the AgriCorps, and as far as he knew had survived everything until Order 66. The chiss boy who was taking the longest to settle had fallen in a conflict before the war, saving the life of his padawan, who had rerouted into becoming a crechemaster afterwards.

The recitation calmed him in the Force, until he noticed that all of the children were deep in meditation. He smiled and, after a touch of the Force, withdrew.

In much better spirits, he walked over to a group that was having some more trouble. He sat down with them, opening himself up to the Force again, which buzzed happily at him as he did. He tried to figure out why before he sensed a familiar presence on the fringes of the group, likely not in the circle--Kenobi. Who the Force seemed to be practically throwing at him. 

That didn’t matter at the moment. He waited until the group was mostly calmed and in sync with the Force, discounting a few who had fallen asleep, before he made his way over to the corner that Kenobi was hiding in. The ginger looked up at his sudden appearance.  _ Tear-streaked cheeks, and karking hells what was he supposed to do with that at this age? _

He crouched next to him and made his voice as soft as he could make it. “Hello, youngling.”

“H-hi, Master,” Kenobi sniffled at him, making an aborted movement to reach for comfort. Mace wondered at the turn this night had taken as he drew the child in front of him into a hug. Small hands clutched back at him, and he made small soothing motions as he picked him up and took him out of the room.

He began to look around for somewhere it would be safe to take the youngling, acknowledging one of the crechemasters as he passed by him in the hall. Kenobi didn’t even look up from where he had buried his face in Mace’s shoulder. It took Mace a minute to realize that that wasn’t just a child seeking comfort, but that Kenobi was having some kind of vision. His presence in the Force was distanced, distracted, but not any more distressed than it had been before, so he decided to wait and see what happened.

A few minutes after they arrived at an empty playroom, Kenobi looked up at him with grey eyes that seemed to carry a surprising age and depth. “You’re Master Windu.”

“Yes, youngling.”

“You feel weird, not like the crechemasters. And you’re a bit sad. I remind you of someone, I think. Are they gone?”

“In a manner of speaking,” Mace closed his eyes. The child in front of him was six standard, and it wouldn’t be fair to compare him to the strong Jedi Master of his memories. While Mace had no doubt that this Kenobi could and would reach such heights, he was his own person. “I hope your vision was pleasant?”

“Bruck’s going to break a holopad tomorrow. It’ll be an accident, and he’ll blame me, but Crechemaster Dora won’t, so I won’t get in trouble.” Kenobi said, matter of fact.

“I see.” Mace said. “Does he blame you for things often?”

“Only when he thinks he’s going to get in a lot of trouble.” Kenobi shrugged. “He’s not going to get away with taking my dinner tomorrow though, because Reeft is going to tell. He only tried because he was mad about the pad. And I won’t be hungry, because you have a granola bar.”

Mace laughed. “You sound so certain.” He pulled out the granola bars he always kept on hand  and gave one to Kenobi. “But don’t skip dinner tomorrow, I won’t give them to you every day.”

Kenobi shrugged. “I know. The Force tells me things sometimes, and it wouldn’t tell me something wrong. The Force isn’t mean for fun like Bruck.”

“And do you talk to any adults about when the Force tells you things?” 

“Sometimes. But the crechemasters think that it’s weird that the Force tells me things so often, they think I’m making it up.” Kenobi frowned. “But I’m not making it up. The Force doesn’t tell me everything, but it likes to talk to me.”

“Likes to talk, kriffing hells,” Mace muttered to himself, before raising his voice to speaking volume. “Does the Force ever show you scary things?”

“Sometimes.” Kenobi’s grip tightened on his tunics. “I knew that Master S’salka wasn’t coming back to the Temple before he left, but no one would listen, and he didn’t come back.” The boy sniffled. “Master Yoda listens sometimes, but he didn’t, and it didn’t matter that I knew anything.”

_ Shit. _ Mace scrambled to salvage the situation. Why hadn’t someone taken Kenobi under their wing? He’d known that he’d had visions, but of death, that young? “Well, you know, if you see something scary like that again, you can tell the crechemasters, and they can make sure you get to talk about it, with Master Yoda even?” Tears forming at the corners of Kenobi’s eyes.  _ Sithspit, this is why he avoided kids. _ “Or I could tell them to let me know, and if I’m in the Temple, you can talk to me?”

The Force sang in his ear, and both his ears popped simultaneously. A ringing headache followed; he winced. Was that a shatterpoint? Was there a shatterpoint between him and Kenobi? What in the Force’s name?

“Something just happened.” Kenobi said, before yawning.

“Something did,” agreed Mace. “But first, I think it’s time for younglings to go to bed.”

“Will you be back?”

“Soon,” Mace promised, picking up the boy’s hand to lead him back to his clan. “I promise.”

___________________________________________________________________________

Mace settled things in the creche as quickly as he could and returned to his quarters. While he wished dearly to talk to Tahl or even Drallig about what had happened, the shatterpoint had left him with a splitting headache and a deadened sensitivity to the Force. Seeking it out was rather like trying to take in stimuli after a pair of flash-bangs go off on either side. He wrapped his blankets around himself and hoped that he’d feel better in the morning.

He’d hoped that he was just exhausted enough to sleep through the night without an issue, so it surprised him to find himself aware. Not awake, the thought came to him unbidden, but dreaming.  _ By the Force, when was the last time he’d dreamt of something other than war? _

He saw an older Padawan Kenobi laughing with friends in the distance and wondered if he was seeing some kind of vision. It had never happened before but if the Force could toss him a few decades back in time, what was a few visions? It was probably a side effect of the shatterpoint: he felt both closed off from the Force and excruciatingly oversensitive.

The group of friends broke up in the distance, and he watched Yoda approach Kenobi, who bent to let the Grandmaster hop onto his back. 

“Obi-Wan, good to see you it is,” Yoda said, ears twitching. “The child you and your master brought, flourishing she is, in the Bear clan.”

“That is good to hear, Grandmaster,” Kenobi smiled. “Though you might want to make sure you have a few more beds ready: I think Master Billaba is going to be bringing back three from Cato Nemoida. And there’s at least one more youngling being brought in through the nontraditional route sometime after, though I’m not sure by whom. They’re all going into Bear Clan too--they’re going to end up sleeping in my spare cloak four months from now.”

“Prepared, we will be. Appreciated, the warning is.” Yoda’s ears flattened against his head. “Grandmaster, I no longer am; know this you do.”

“You will always be as a Grandmaster to me, Master Yoda,” Kenobi disagreed gently. “Though I can see why you wanted to retire, given how much work my Master and Master Koon have been doing.”

Yoda made a noise of disagreement, before chuckling. The pair faded out into the background, and Mace again found himself floating in an emptiness that neither the Dark nor the Light could fill, because he would not let them. Could not let them, he knew, though he knew not why.

He woke, hours later, more exhausted than he was when he went to sleep, and with the ironclad certainty that they had been thrown back in time to fix that damned line of broken and Fallen Jedi, and that the Force had assigned him to Kenobi, for some strange, unidentifiable reason. Damn it all, he really needed to talk to Tahl. If she hadn’t stuffed the idea into his head...

Tracking her down turned out to be surprisingly easy. As soon as he’d turned into her section of the residence halls, he heard raised voices. She and Jinn were shouting at each other, and from the sound of it, it wasn’t pretty. Mace was just about ready to intervene, but it suddenly cut off, and Jinn came storming down the hall. The man looked bad, unkempt and angry. Mace flattened himself to the wall as he went past.

Her door was ajar when he reached it, so he knocked on the wall beside it before letting himself in. “Tahl?”

“Here,” she called back. She was mopping up a puddle of spilled tea. There was some broken crockery laid out on a towel on the table. 

He shrugged off his robe and moved to clean the side of the table, which was dripping. “I take it that Jinn was stubborn then?”

“As a bantha with a sore foot,” Tahl agreed, shaking her head. “Certain that he’s taking the right path with Xanatos, angry that he couldn’t count on me to believe in him anymore.”

“He’d always been just that side of arrogant, wasn’t he.” Mace said. 

“A bit. But I remember trying to reach him the first time, and I’m not sure what I can do better now. There doesn’t seem to be any tactic I haven’t tried.” 

They worked in silence for a few minutes, and the kitchen was soon clean again. “I had a vision last night.” Mace said abruptly. “Probably because a shatterpoint went off near Kenobi yesterday.”

“And you?” Tahl filled in the blank, lips quirking up in a smile. 

“And me.”

“Well, someone needs to teach him not to ignore the Force when it’sinconvenient. And speaking of shatterpoints--” 

“Tahl--” Mace tried to interrupt her, but Tahl ignored him.

“And speaking of shatterpoints, I’d like it if you could check Qui-Gon for new ones, and Xanatos as well. The theory that we’re supposed to save the Jedi by setting that lineage on the straight and narrow is nice, but if we’re wrong and I’m supposed to be doing something else...well, it’s not like I’d abandon Qui-Gon, but the Force has to have sent us here for a reason. The clones, maybe.”

“Sifo-Dyas is still here, and if the Force wanted us to deal with the clones, wouldn’t it have sent Shaak Ti? Or Plo Koon? Or, sithing hells, Kenobi even? You never knew them, and Drallig wouldn’t have spent much time with them either. They’re not a even sparkle in anyone’s eyes yet.” 

“It was just a thought.” Tahl shook her head. “I’m going to go check on Qui-Gon. I’ve got another chance to help him, I’m hardly going to let him make the same mistakes if I can help it.”

“Fine. Though you might want to give him some time to cool off. Do you know when his next mission is?”

“Two and a half weeks, Xanatos is apparently nursing a broken saber arm from their last mission. They’ve only got a few more before Telos.”

“And yours?”

“Six days. Gena’s piloting exams are in three, so she’s cramming all the simulator time she can.” Tahl pushed a new cup of tea in front of Mace. “Stop avoiding the point, Mace. It’s not like you”

Mace raised the steaming cup to his lips. Tahl had unquestionable taste in tea. “I’m not. The Force is dragging you to Jinn the way it’s been dragging me to Kenobi. Only you’re working on shorter time because you both have padawans, and Kenobi has years in the creche still. The Force has got more in store for us, if we’re going to change the future and not just Yoda’s line. Or who’s to say it won’t be your line next time, or Ki Adi’s, or anyone else’s.”

“So talk to Yoda, if you think that’ll help. Or, hells, Drallig, since he actually teaches the young ones.” Tahl went to pour herself a second cup. “Or go down to the creche yourself.”

Mace was about to respond, but both of their datapads chimed. His was the tone he’d set for Drallig after their first meeting. Tahl set down her tea and they both turned to read the message. 

There wasn’t much too it, just a time, and an room number. There wasn’t much risk in them talking, since there was no one who had any reason to think they were up to anything let alone the truth, so it had to be about something sensitive. The Sith maybe, or perhaps Dooku had already gone. It was likely urgent, but since Drallig hadn’t asked for them immediately he didn’t want to dwell on it until until later that night.

“We might as well talk to Qui-Gon after we meet with Drallig. Give him the day to cool off, maybe think a bit, if anything I said got through his thick skull.” Tahl worried at the nearly empty kettle.

“It’s Qui-Gon Jinn, the entire fucking Order knows how far he’d go to make a point.” Mace argued, before standing. “Thanks for the tea. I’ll see you later.” 

Tahl smiled weakly and gestured at the door, so Mace did actually go and return to his quarters. On the way back, he distracted himself by thinking about sending a message to Depa. He had a few months before she reached the end of her first year of knighthood, which also meant a few more months before being asked to join the council following the illness of Kolya Atekka, a fairly young twi’leki Master.

He would ensure that Depa did not come to the same fate as she had in the future. He tried to feel and release his grief but it had hurt to lose her perhaps most of all. While she was on a mission, it was easy to forget that she was a new knight, not a seasoned Master with her second Padawan at her heels. 

He remembered how he’d kept abreast of the missions that she’d been sent on and it had been quick work to find that holofile. She was just about to start a new mission in the Mid-Rim, to oversee something or other on her home planet of Chalacta. It was probably an easy assignment, as the planet had always been relatively peaceful, even when most of the galaxy was at war.

He checked his comm and saw that he’d gotten a message from Depa just the night before. He opened it up and a holo of Depa appeared, her hair up in her customary braids. She’d adopted them when she was fifteen, and he’d braided them many times since, sometimes to hide the padawan braid  when they were on sensitive missions, and other times just because it was a soothing ritual.

He was brought back out of reminiscence by her voice. “Hello, Master. I’m sorry it’s been a while since I’ve sent you anything. My assignment on Turin exploded in a big way, and so did half of the government buildings in their capital.” Depa laughed nervously, pulling at her sleeves. “I’m mostly alright though, a bit singed. I don’t remember most of our missions being like this! But I’m learning a lot, and things were better when I left than when I got there. I hope things are good back at the Temple, and that I hear from you soon. Take care, Master!”

_ Take care, indeed. Karking hells, she was so young _ . Mace shook his head. It was as he had told Tahl earlier; this is why he bothered in the first place. For Depa, and his grandpadawans-to-be, and all of the Jedi and their padawans in the future. He reached for the right buttons to send her back a message--and taking a moment to be grateful that he had the hands and fingers to do it right the first time.

The recording button clicked on and he did his best to arrange his face into a smile. “Depa, it’s good to hear from you. I hope you keep safe this time--no exploding buildings on Chalacta. I’ve had an interesting time of things, but I’m looking forward to seeing you in a few months. Though I might not be here when you get back, the Healers are talking about finally clearing me.” His commlink buzzed with a message from Yoda. Surprised and annoyed, and he looked back into the camera. “I have to keep this short; Master Yoda wants me for something. May the Force be with you, Depa. You’ve grown into a wonderful Jedi.”

He shut the communication link and watched as Depa’s cycled to signify that his message was working through the Temple link to the global and galactic networks. As soon as he saw that it had gone through he opened up Yoda’s, only to find an invitation to lunch with no further details. He winced, wondering if he was quite up to interacting with someone who would be able to tell he was different than his past self, but Yoda would assume something was wrong if Mace refused the invitation.

With that in mind he wrote out a quick acceptance. He had an hour or so before he had to leave,and settled for spending the time doing quarter-katas without a saber. He rinsed off quickly when he finished, and set off for Yoda’s abode.

He ended up being just on time, which was something of a relief. Yoda opened the door to let him in and led him over to a low table. Mace knelt on a cushion, grateful that Yoda had sandwiches to offer his human digestive system.

“Well you are healing, the Healers have said. Active duty, they are willing to recommend, yes, yes. But talking of what you have seen, you have not been. The Force, silent it has been?” Yoda asked.

Mace chewed for a moment, deciding what to reveal. “The Force has revealed a great deal, but not all of it required intervention at higher levels,” he phrased delicately, hearing Yoda harrumph before grinning ruefully. Delicate wasn’t quite his style.

“I don’t think anyone who doesn’t already see the path Xanatos DuCrion is on will believe it before it happens, and I don’t see why it matters for people to know that I’ve found my next padawan.” The words tasted good leaving his mouth; Mace knew that it was the right decision, with the Force backing up his intuition.

“Hmmph, intend, you do, to take on Kenobi?” Mace heard the slight disapproval, but leaving things to Qui-Gon Jinn again wasn’t an option. The man was good in the field but he needed to relearn how to teach before being given another padawan. Sith knew how Feemor had turned out alright.

“If he’ll have me, then yes.” Mace took another bite of sandwich. “But as I said, that’s hardly going to happen next week. I’d worry more about finding a female Master to take on Komari Vosa, and doing a sweep of all the Knights and Masters up for taking on padawans, to make sure they know how to teach. Remedial classes shouldn’t be too hard to set up. And actually assign more crechemasters. They’re stretched a bit thin at the moment and bullying, left unchecked, will lead to younglings Falling in the end.” Yoda made a noise, but Mace continued. “I’ve not felt anything of the outer conflict except that there will be a few in the next decade years, which is already known to those of us who use the Unifying Force, and in greater detail than I’m likely to be able to relate.”

That was even true: he knew of the deaths, where some of the battles had taken place, and so on, but Mace had been largely uninvolved in most of the far-flung conflicts the first time around, discounting his minor role in ending the Stark Hyperspace War. In any case, the Force seemed eager for him to deal with things closer to home. He had no problem revealing that factoid either, so, faced with Yoda’s disapproval, he did.

“I can see the shatterpoint, but it’s not where the Force wants me to focus. And since I’m not meant to be involved, the shatterpoint isn’t inducing any visions or precognition.” Mace caught Yoda’s eyes. “But I would talk to Master Me’qyun-Soim about that instead. So--why have you invited me today?”

“Sharp one you are, Master Windu, yes, yes.” Yoda nodded to himself. “Seen soon, Me’qyun-Soim has, Councillor Atekka become very ill. Seen too, that ask you we will to take her seat. Ask, we did not wish, when ill you were as well. But since healed you now are, ask we do. Our wish it is, Master Windu, for you to join the Council. Instruct you, Councillor Atekka will. Agrees on this, the Force does.”

Mace couldn’t have hidden his surprise if he’d wanted to. He’d expected to be having this conversation several months from now, and he certainly hadn’t known that people had seen him on the Council before he’d been assigned there. He was young for it, but he’d been willing to stand up to them and tell them to fuck off diplomatically--and, judging by the cadre of young Masters who had been chosen after him, that was a key factor in his favor.

“That is--quite an honor,” he replied to Yoda. He knew he needed the influence of being a Council member, paperwork be damned. He’d accepted last time because he’d feared he’d never be able to do missions again; now he accepted because he’d be able to clear house much more quickly than he’d expected to be able to. The Council would be more willing to believe the resurgence of the Sith if he were there to agree, for one. “When would I be expected to start?”

Yoda’s ears betrayed his excitement. “In three days, the next full meeting is. Details, I will make sure to send. Good for the Council, you will be. Now, try my dessert, you must.”

Yoda brought out a bug-infused cake, which Mace spent the next few minutes declining. He checked the time and made a quick escape, shaking off the slight surprise that remained. It was already almost time to meet with Drallig, so he began making his way over to the meditation room, reviewing what Yoda had said as he walked.

Drallig and Tahl were already there when he walked in, both sporting serious faces. Once the door shut, Drallig passed him the datapad he had been holding. “Palpatine is on Coruscant; he’s a junior senator. I’ve found no clues as to who his Master is yet though, if they’re still alive.”

“Getting any of us assigned to Senate duty would be a pain,” Mace commented.

“I was just saying that that’s not where Gena’s skills lay at all, we’ve got no business there,” Tahl agreed. “She’s much better at wrangling refugees than politicians.”

“Do you think Knight Billaba could be convinced, when she gets back?” Drallig asked. 

“Not without knowing why.”

“We might have to bring in someone else then, but Palpatine’s here for a while longer, right? We can probably put that off until we have a better idea what’s going on in the Order.” Tahl posited.

“Speaking of that,” Drallig grinned. “I’ve convinced Dooku to teach Makashi to several classes of advanced students. He wants to teach, but given the Vosa situation I thought it’d be best to keep him in the Temple as opposed to setting him up with another padawan.”

“Give him connections, give him a reason to stay,” Mace agreed.

“Try and convince him to teach some of the Knights and Masters as well?” Tahl suggested. “I don’t think he’s ever had friends outside of Sifo-Dyas. Who we still need to plan for, but that’s not quite as urgent.”

“I might have a solution for that.” Mace said. “I’ve been asked to join the Council, with full disclosure that my connection with the Unifying Force has directed me to worry over events in the Temple.”

“Congratulations,” Drallig enthused, slapping his arm gently. “I suppose you’re going to work towards creating some sort of mentorship program?”

Mace smiled. “Yes. I think those of us who use the Unifying Force need more than what we already have under Master Me’qyun-Soim, since it clearly wasn’t enough last time. If Sifo-Dyas felt he needed to act on his own, then the system failed him. So we need to change the system.”

“Mhmm, Sifo-Dyas is hardly the only one that benefits from that,” Tahl snarked. “How’s Obi-Wan doing?”

Mace gave her a look, which Drallig pointedly ignored. “That’s the best kind of solution,” Drallig agreed.

They soon broke for the evening, and Mace was more than ready to get some sleep. It had been a long, interesting day, making for a long and interesting week now that he had promised to approach Qui-Gon with Tahl. While he could probably sense for shatterpoints from a distance, it would be easier to do it from sitting next to Qui-Gon, and maybe somehow he’d be able to do something about Xanatos.

___________________________________________________________________________

If here was one thing Mace was grateful for the next morning, it was that he had been too exhausted to dream the night previous. The Force had let him alone for once. He was grateful. The situation with the Council hadn’t quite hit him yet, but he had another couple days to worry over that before it became real. 

He ate a quick meal at the commissary before meeting Tahl near Jinn’s area of the residence halls. Hopefully the man had recovered some in the last day, or this might get a bit ugly. It probably would anyway; Qui-Gon had always been stubborn as anything. It was partly arrogance, but even when they were both children Jinn had been a compulsive contrarian. 

Tahl knocked on the door. Checking the Force, it was easy to tell that both Jinn and DuCrion were in. Jinn opened the door, scowl mostly disappearing when he looked at Tahl. She pulled the door the rest of the way open and muscled her way past him. 

“Why is he here?” Jinn gestured at Mace, who still stood in the doorway.

“Mace is a friend, Qui-Gon, though I wonder if you still know what that means. He’s also seen something about you, and I’d like to make sure that everything’s alright,” Tahl called back, already preparing to make a kettle of tea.

Jinn side-eyed him, but held open the door for him to walk through. It was probably the best Mace was going to get. The three of them sat at the table, enjoying to various extents the boilerberry tea Tahl had brewed them. The silence was mostly awkward, and Mace took the opportunity to search for shatterpoints.

That wasn’t so difficult; Jinn had several attached to him, at least two of which were imminent. He had to decide between getting a feel for them and looking for DuCrion, and he chose the second.

DuCrion was awake, and thus likely to join them soon, which meant his time was limited. Jinn would surely begin asking questions soon. DuCrion had one shatterpoint that seemed ready to go off any second, and another, smaller one connected to Jinn’s that was only slightly less urgent. The first was connected to someone else, but their identity was elusive.

It was familiar though. Another Jedi, he was sure. Jinn was mixed in as well, but from a distance. He wasn’t sure what it meant, but it didn’t feel Dark; in fact it was Lighter than any of the rest of the Force as it manifested around DuCrion, and he wondered if that meant there was some hope that something would prevent him from Falling.

He tried to sense how the shatterpoints were connected between Master and Padawan. This was what he had truly come for; most of the rest he could have sensed from a distance, but this fine level of connection to the Force was only barely perceptible even at this range. There were many lines between them, indicating the level of attachment between the pair. Deeper connection between Jedi who worked together as long as Masters and Padawans were expected to become close, and a disconnect there would raise questions. It worried him, however, to find that several of those strands had been corrupted into a false inequality. There was good reason that so many were concerned over their connection.

And yet, while both of them held urgent and fairly powerful shatterpoints, neither of those were more than tangentially connected between themselves. DuCrion’s led elsewhere, and Jinn’s attached in part to Tahl, and to one or two others, perhaps. It gave him hope that they were on the right path in dealing with this part of this lineage. 

Suddenly, the door banged open. Mace was standing with a hand on his lightsaber before Jinn had done more than push back his seat, looking at the intruder.

“Feemor!” Jinn called out. “What are you doing here?”

“Hi, Qui-Gon, I’ll be back in a minute,” Stahl called, already heading to DuCrion’s space. Mace’s head exploded into pain as Stahl entered the room and the shatterpoint around DuCrion burst on touching Stahl’s presence in the Force.

Through the ringing in his ears, Mace heard shouting coming from DuCrion’s room. When he managed to look up through the spots in his vision, Jinn was up and heading in that direction, with Tahl’s restraining hand on his arm. He went to join them. Qui-Gon gave him a look.  _ Karking Force, the hell have I done to earn that? I’ve learned my fucking lesson. _

“Feemor, what are you doing?” DuCrion sounded outraged. Mace was mostly amused and a touch concerned. Jinn hadn’t cut Stahl loose yet, as DuCrion was still a Jedi, but Stahl’d had a habit of long-term missions even before Jinn had renounced him. He certainly hadn’t been much involved with the Jinn-DuCrion pair the first time around. Then again, Tahl would likely know more than he did, if there was anything more to the subject.

“Master Tahl!” Stahl called back to them “I don’t suppose you and your padawan have a mission queued up soon?”

“I do, in less than a week. Why?” Tahl asked, obviously concerned. Mace supposed she was as in the dark as he was on this.

“Feemor Stahl, what the karking hell is going on?” Jinn exploded.

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you, but there’s some things that need setting. It’s the will of the Force.” Stahl responded to Jinn, before meeting Tahl’s eyes. “Could you send the details to my pad through the Temple net? Xanatos and I are going to take it on instead. Just--Just Xanatos and I,” Stahl reiterated over Jinn’s sputtering. “Don’t you have a go bag? Sixty seconds and you’ll have to make do with what you’ve got.” He called back to Xanatos.

“You’d be surprised at what I remember, and how much more I can see than I used to,” Tahl hinted. Feemor shot her a surprised look before turning back to his charge.

That apparently got DuCrion moving, as there were several crashing sounds and a loud curse from inside the room. While Feemor chivvied Xanatos, Mace and Tahl exchanged a look.  _ Does he know as well? _

“There we are,” Feemor said at a normal volume, dragging a mostly-dressed DuCrion out of the room with a half-zipped bag. 

“Feemor--” Jinn interjected again, but was ignored.

“I’m stealing your padawan, no need to thank me, good talk,” Feemor spoke so quickly he was garbling his words. “Tahl, where’s that mission?”

“Iridonia--I’ll send the rest.” Tahl replied, bemused.

“I’ll be in touch!” With that, Feemor flashed her a large grin and went, dragging Xanatos out the door with him.

The door closed behind them, and so did the end of Jinn’s patience. “Did you see this?” He nearly yelled at Mace.

Mace’s ears were ringing again by the time Jinn finished, and all traces of his amusement were gone. Tahl also wore a hard expression. Mace was grateful that this shatterpoint didn’t blow away his Force-sense the same way as the one that had been between him and Kenobi had. Still, he wasn’t in a mood to handle Jinn. 

“I didn’t expect that, no,” Mace replied slowly. “Though I did expect something big, imminently.”

“And you didn’t think to mention it to me? I’m still Xanatos’s Master, whatever you think.” Jinn shook his head. “Tahl, why did you bring him?”

“Qui-Gon--” Tahl huffed.

At that moment, Mace’s pad went off with an urgent tone. Mace reached for it clumsily, needing multiple tries to open it. There was a note from the creche on top: apparently Kenobi had had some kind of fit or a vision, and had asked for him.

His first reaction was to be grateful that he had an excuse to get out from Jinn’s presence. The second was more along the lines of  _ karking hells, why today. _ Tahl wasn’t going to thank him for leaving her alone with Jinn, because they both knew that the man would be mostly useless until he calmed down. But, the Force kept moving, and Kenobi seemed like a resilient kid. He wouldn’t have called if he hadn’t actually needed help. Besides, Jinn was probably harmless and at least a few minutes away from getting into more trouble.

“I’m needed in the creche,” Mace directed the statement to Tahl. “We will talk later?”

Tahl glanced at Qui-Gon before turning back. “I’ll handle this.”

Mace glanced at the room’s third occupant and grimaced before swiftly departing. He was glad to be away from the madness. Tahl had her work cut out for her. It had been a long time since Jinn had been such a vocal firebrand; after DuCrion, he’d tended more towards depression and often didn’t bother to be vocal about things he disagreed with, instead just doing his own thing and expecting people to fall in line. He wasn’t sure he preferred this version, even if he knew that DuCrion’s manipulations was partly responsible for this transformation from the calmer rebel he remembered. He had to wonder how close Jinn was to Falling himself.

The silence of the hallway and lifts was oppressive after the anger that had filled the Jinn-DuCrion quarters. Still, he fought to clear his mind so he would be able to help Kenobi. 

When he reached the creche, he was quickly ushered to a meditation room that was clearly set up for children: everything was at least a foot closer to the floor than in a normal meditation room. A quick survey of the room revealed that Kenobi had wedged himself into a far corner. He looked impossibly small from the doorway, and Mace was hit again by the fact that his old friend was just a child who had a lot to do to grow into himself, and a harsh path to get there.

“Kenobi?” He called softly. “Obi-Wan?”

Dark grey eyes looked up from under a lock of hair, but the boy didn’t move as he approached except to hug his knees tighter.

“The Force was excited today, I know,” And Mace  _ knew _ , having been right near the epicenter. “Did it show you something scary?”

Kenobi nodded forcefully.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Mace tried to gentle his voice, but wasn’t very successful judging by how Kenobi drew further inwards. Mace wondered what horror he’d seen. DuCrion Falling, perhaps? 

Kenobi finally spoke up, in a smaller voice than Mace had ever heard from him. “It was the Padawan who wasn’t from the creche.” Mace’s heart stopped for a moment. Was Kenobi having visions of  _ Skywalker? _ “One of the Masters crashed a ship, but they were okay, they just couldn’t tell anyone they were. And then he found the Padawan, but something happened and he died and another Master found her, or he got the comm to work and they got them, or the pirates got them first. But the Padawan always kills someone and I wish she didn’t.”

Mace wasn’t quite following the trail of visions, though he thought he had the gist of things; multiple possibilities is how he saw shatterpoints. He’d thought that Kenobi had had visions of only the most likely future, but that was a question for another day. He wondered who the Padawan was; probably not Skywalker.

“Are those people trying to hurt her?” Mace asked.

“Sometimes. They’re not good people either.” Kenobi wiped his eyes and nose on the sleeve of his robe.

“Thank you for telling me,” Mace tried to catch Kenobi’s eyes. “If I know more of what to look for, I can make sure that they’re not left alone, or that that never happens. Do you remember anything else?”

“When I saw the Master get ki-killed, he always called the Padawan Asajj, and the Padawan yelled for ‘Master Ky’.” Kenobi sniffled again, and this time Mace moved so that the boy was leaning up against him.  _ Asajj Ventress? A Padawan? To Ky Narec? Was the Force making him responsible for her too? Bloody sith hells. _

He hushed Kenobi, running a hand up and down his back. He remembered reading the file that an older Kenobi would put together on Ventress: she was Dathomiran but from Rattatak, a planet that was at war with itself quite often; she must have been stranded there somehow. Ky Narec must have found her there when he’d gone missing, and Dooku had taken over at some point from there.

The vision was gruesome, from the little bits that he sensing through the Force; it was probably for the best that Kenobi had cried himself nearly to sleep. Mace wrapped the child in his cloak further and found that Obi-Wan had gotten handfuls of his tunics. It was easier just to sit and meditate for a while and let the boy rest. It wasn’t like he didn’t need it desperately.

The first shatterpoint had been too close for him to get a clear view of the possible paths to come, but he’d already made the decision to take on Kenobi. Barring an extremely good reason, the child would stay at his side for his Padawanship, whatever Mace had to do to see that happen.

The second, however… DuCrion wasn’t in a good place. Even with Stahl’s help, he might never become the kind of person one needed to be to be an effective Jedi Knight. But he also might, either taking on a Corps attach é position with Feemor, or possibly becoming the kind of Knight he’d trained to be, but not under Jinn’s tutelage. Or he returned to Jinn’s tutelage and Telos happened the way it did before.

There were many smaller branches, where decisions happened slightly differently, but Mace was reassured that Stahl was the person DuCrion needed to listen to, and that Stahl knew what was coming as well as he did. 

Several hours had passed while he explored decision tree after decision tree, and he was stiff and sore from sitting awkwardly next to Kenobi. Still, the boy showed no signs of waking, and he needed to move one way or another, so he gently shook his shoulder to wake him up. 

Force bless him: the boy was bleary, but awake. He gently guided the boy over to a proper bed and disentangled his robe from Kenobi’s gummy grip slowly but surely. He explained what had happened to a concerned crechemaster before leaving the area. Hells, but he was tired after this day. He could eat a protein bar back in his own quarters, talk to Tahl quickly, and then get some sleep.

Mace was grateful that his trip back to his quarters was relatively quiet, and that he had remembered to keep an extra few packs of the tough bantha jerky he’d enjoyed as a snack during the war. He found that he wasn’t that hungry, but he knew better than to skip eating. Opening up his comm, he was relieved to see the Tahl had marked herself as available and sent a call her way.

“Tahl.” Tahl’s voice was even.

“Tahl,” Mace started, and stopped. What does one say after a display like this morning? “I hope you smoothed things over with Jinn?”

“It wasn’t as bad as it could have been. He calmed down a bit after you left, and then I was able to convince him that Feemor wouldn’t hurt Xanatos, just take him for some lineage brother bonding.”

“Good.” Mace again found himself flat-footed. “Was he always like this at this age?”

“On so much of a hair trigger you mean? I think he was, but he wasn’t in your circle then. But enough about Jinn, how was Kenobi?” Tahl’s voice conveyed curiosity, but Mace knew how protective she was.

“Spooked by a gruesome vision. He’s sleeping it off now. Have you heard from Stahl?”

“Feemor? Not yet, though he acknowledged that he got my mission package. Gena was glad for an extra few days of leave. We’ll probably pick up Qui-Gon’s next mission instead, but that’s not for a while.” 

Mace couldn’t hold in a yawn, and Tahl laughed. “Get some sleep. There’s nothing left that can’t wait a day.”

“I will, then. May the Force be with you.” Tahl echoed the sentiment, smiling, before disconnecting. Mace turned off his and prepared for bed. He felt like he’d been run over by the Force one too many times in the last day. 

He woke up the next morning, decently well rested and wondering what fresh hell was awaiting him. While he was eating a quick breakfast his comm chimed with an incoming data packet from Stahl. That made sense--Iridonia was in the Mid-Rim, and civilian technologies to let them have real-time chats at that distance were had not quite become available yet.

“Lo, Master Windu,” Stahl’s cheerful voice reached his ears. “Tahl mentioned that you also remembered what happens next, and something about being grateful for the body parts you still have? I think you know what path my brother over here was going down.

“I apologize for the abruptness of everything, as I expect I’m going to keep having to, but I remembered everything in a rush, and I’m not used to the Force screaming at me the way it was. I’ve put a lot of effort into being good, but I’m not like most of my Line; I’ve never been destined for greatness.

“For now, I’m going to keep Xanatos with me, and try to teach him some humility.” Stahl chuckled. “I think you’re supposed to be joining the Council soon? Any help in that area would be more than appreciated. I’d like to keep my kidnap of him secret for a while. He could use it. I’ll deal with Master when I get back. Uh, take care. May the Force be with you.”

The communication froze on Stahl’s slightly sheepish mien, and Mace sighed. The dramatics did fit in quite well with the last of that particular lineage. 

___________________________________________________________________________

The next few days went off fairly easily. Mace had had another lunch with Yoda, discussing the basics of his new place on the Council that he might not have already known if he hadn’t had decades of experience on that same Council. He’d also met again with Drallig and watched Dooku teach a Makashi class. Drallig was doing good work on that one.

Mace also had had another appointment with the Healers, who again confirmed that his bond was sufficiently healed for him to start taking on the stress of a Council position, which was a relief. There was still some confusion on that end, but not enough for him to be seriously concerned over a Healer making an issue of things. They seemed just as glad that he had recovered in the end, which he appreciated.

All too soon, it was time for Mace to actually join the Council. There weren’t any true rituals involved, epsecially as he wasn’t becoming an official member as far as the rest of the Order was concerned for several months yet pending his performance, but it was still important to make a good start with things.

He made sure to take the lift to get there a few minutes early. Mace was surprised to find himself a bit nervous despite everything, but he also had a great deal of experience in pushing that feeling away in situations with more at stake, so he easily acknowledged and released the feeling to the Force as Yoda’s gimer stick sounded on the tile of the Council Antechamber.

“Ready, you are.” It wasn’t a question. 

“Yes,” Mace said. He was ready to face the future.

The doors opened to admit them. Yoda hobbled over to his seat, his usual illusion of frailty securely in place. Mace had nowhere to sit, so he ended up leaning against the pillars by the windows as the last few members trickled in. 

He let his mind wander as they waited. He remembered the windows in the Chancellor’s office, how they broke, how he couldn’t grab onto anything because he had no hands to, but how he’d used the Force to slow his fall until he’d landed mostly safely in the Lower Levels. He was lucky his stumps hadn’t gotten too badly infected. He was lucky he’d survived. But the windows here were sturdier, he knew. He could run into them at full tilt and they wouldn’t shatter. There was a reason the younglings hid here when the Temple was under attack.

He shook off the memories as Yoda called the Council to order. 

That order lasted maybe half of an hour before a Temple Guard asked to be admitted unexpectedly. Mace felt a pang of unease. Zie was carrying a bag that stank of darkness. “They were found on the southern steps of the Temple. No one saw them get dropped off, they just appeared between one sweep and the next.”

“Uncover them, you will,” Yoda demanded. The guard dipped zir head in acknowledgment and opened the bag.

Two heads were inside. Mace recognized one as Palpatine. Young Palpatine didn’t look overly different from the man who had become Chancellor on the strength of his planet’s suffering. There were fewer lines on his face, and his hair was a bit brighter. Mace wondered if being a Sith had aged him prematurely. 

The other one, he presumed, was Darth Plagueis. Hego Damask of the InterGalactic Banking Clan. Rumored to have his hands in every pot, stirring up discord and war in many places, running an effectively criminal empire of epic proportions. And, apparently, a Sith. He never would have guessed, which he supposed was the point.

“Who are they?” Saesee Tiin asked.

“The one is Hego Damask. The other is a Junior Senator, if my memories ring true,” Plo Koon stared at them, tapping his claws on the edge of his armrest. “They emanate Sith energy, but the Sith were wiped out.”

“Obviously not,” Yarael Poof cut in. “They must have been killed by a Sith.”

“Perhaps they were Sith?” Mace cut in. “The energy is rather concentrated in them instead of just on their wounds.

“Do we have any Masters on Coruscant with a psychometry talent?” Tsola R’ven asked, looking around. “If that is indeed Sith energy, no Padawan needs to be exposed to it.

“Master Cill might be useful,” Atekka suggested. 

There was another knock at the door. A frazzled crechemaster stepped into the room. “Masters! One of the younglings is having a vision and he’s insisting the Sith are back. A junior padawan was brought into it by accident as well.”

“Oh, Master Windu!” The woman caught sight of him. “It’s Kenobi, can you--”

“Where is he?” Mace asked, immediately concerned. Suddenly, making sure Kenobi was safe was all he could think of.

“The Room of a Thousand Fountains.”

Mace took off out of the room at a lope. The other Masters would join him as soon as they were able to cover the distance, he was sure, but for the moment propriety was his last concern. He took the stairs instead of the lift, nearly jumping entire flights of stairs in his rush.

He found Kenobi squeezing himself into a ball against one of the many fountains in the room. A junior padawan he recognized as a young Quinlan Vos was sat next to him. Neither of them were responding to the outside world. The rest of Kenobi’s class was likely back at the creche, and Mace was glad for the absence. It made his job easier.

Mace sat in front of the boys and reached for the Unifying Force. It exploded with color and possibility, centering on the boys in front of him. Slowly, surely, he coaxed the Unifying Force to let them free from its grip, to return them to their bodies in the Temple. He knew as soon as he’d succeeded because Kenobi launched himself at Mace, who felt his hands go around the small body of their own volition, not that he would or even could have done anything else. 

“The scary person killed the bad men,” Kenobi burst out unprompted.

Vos was still returning to his senses. It made sense; he likely wasn’t used to that kind of vision the way Kenobi was. Mace turned to him for confirmation.

“Master,” the padawan looked up at him with a bit of fear. “I think it was Sith that Obi-Wan saw. They called each other ‘Darth’ and used the Dark Side of the Force. The muun I think I know from somewhere, but the other guy was wearing a Senator’s ring. And then a person in a dark cloak that covered their face told the Sith that they were a better Sith than them and killed them both, and took away a zabrak kid. He didn’t look too good.”

“He was scared,” Kenobi spoke into Mace’s shoulder. “The big one told him he wasn’t going to hurt him, but the kid didn’t believe him.”

The Council had assembled behind him and listened to the accounting. There was an immediate outburst by several members at the assumption that there was a Sith involved. Mace felt like rolling his eyes.  _ Force fuck another Sith, not this shit again _ .

That disbelief had gotten Jinn killed last time. Mace was going to nip it in the bud this time. “The Sith still exist. Or they did, up until this person killed them. Now, can we focus on helping these children? We can figure out how to deal with the dead Sith afterwards.” At that an image unfolded in his mind. Who had killed Palpatine and Damask? He remembered the briefing packet that Kenobi had put together about Maul. But then there was the question of his age--Maul was likely the child, leaving the adult Sith in question. Dooku was in the Temple, Obi-Wan had Seen Ventress, and it was clear that Skywalker would raise a lightsaber to his old friend--he'd already chosen him over the rest of the Jedi. It was likely some Sith they had never heard of, then, possibly a former apprentice one had killed. 

There was some grumbling. Plo Koon was helping Vos along, making sure to touch him only where his skin was covered with clothing. Mace carried Kenobi on his back.

Yoda walked beside him. “A bond, you two have.”

Mace felt in his mind, and easily found where a small piecce of Kenobi’s Force had taken residence. He let out a small smile. “Yes, we do.”

“Good. Teach him, you will.” Several moments passed. “Sith, still out there, they may be.”

“I would think so, Master Yoda.”

“Prepared to face them, will we be?”

“We must be.”

___________________________________________________________________________

“Depa.” Mace beamed when Depa walked off of her ship. They had had occasional messages exchanged, but as per tradition they hadn’t seen each other in person since the day she’d left just over a year before.

She rushed over to give him a hug. Mace hugged her back tightly. It was moments like these that made all the problems associated with teaching padawans worthwhile.

And then she used that particular tone of voice on him. “Master,” She smirked, tone oozing mischief. “So, when do I meet the new child you’ve taken under your big wings?”

“Just as soon as you explain why there’s another life form on your ship,” Mace replied, amused.

A younger woman stepped out tentatively. “This is Shmi Skywalker,” Depa’s tone was testing.

Mace felt his eyes round out and his gaze flickered between them. “I suppose that you recognize the names Grey and Ponds then?”

Depa grinned. “It’s good to see you again, Master.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, so, this is the first in a series! There is more to come! Though I can't promise when, as I'm still in a late initial outline, but it should be fun! Stay tuned!


End file.
